Chapter 24. Enhanced Power Version...
"What on earth is that?"
Duncan, carrying his case, caught up with Fred and George and asked.
"Do you remember?"
"We told you before."
"We want to make a new gadget."
"Hugely powerful, and very funny."
"It's that little ball, our prototype."
"That was originally a gift we prepared for Snape."
"We thought we'd lost it ages ago."
"Never thought Pro nicked it and then dropped it on the floor!"
Fred and George sprinted flat out while explaining to Duncan.
Listening to their left-right patter like a comic double act and never getting to the point, Duncan simply cut them off.
"Stop, stop, what exactly does that little ball do?"
Fred didn't answer.
He glanced back.
The little ball on the floor, with the rocking of the train, was rolling to and fro on the boards.
He kept praying in his head that it would hold on a bit longer, that it absolutely wouldn't touch anything before they got away.
But three students slid open the compartment door and came in from the corridor.
The boy in front was not tall, pale-faced, walking with a swagger and a very punchable look.
Two students followed behind him like his bodyguards.
Short and squat, particularly ugly, wearing silly grins, they echoed everything the boy said.
"Crabbe, look, that little ball is really pretty!"
One of them spotted the little ball on the floor and jabbed his elbow at the one next to him.
Crabbe looked as well, greed flashing in his eyes, and bent to pick it up.
"Keep away from it, don't touch it!" Fred warned sharply. "Malfoy, get them out of here!"
"Oh?" Malfoy raised an eyebrow, assuming Fred wanted it and that was why he was driving them off.
"I don't need that rubbish, but we saw it first, so it's ours."
Malfoy slanted a look at Fred and waved his hand.
"Crabbe, pick it up. I want to see whether he dares come up and fight us for it!"
"Mm!"
Crabbe grunted, strained to bend down, and stretched out his thick, stubby fingers.
But whether he used too much force, or the ball itself was too fragile—
Crack.
The little ball's round body touched the surface of Crabbe's finger and split into several pieces.
Panic flickered across Crabbe's face.
He hurriedly looked up and said, "I—I didn't mean to."
Draco Malfoy's brows knitted.
He had just opened his mouth to speak when he heard Fred's furious curse.
"Are all you Malfoys idiots? We told you not to touch it. A bunch of morons!"
Malfoy froze for a beat, then shot back in anger.
"Bloody Weasleys..."
Fred had no mind to listen.
He had seen that the little ball on the ground was already starting to melt.
His Adam's apple bobbed.
The corner of his mouth twitched uncontrollably.
Terror took over his whole face.
"Duncan, run—run as far as you can, or it'll be too late!"
As the words fell, Fred and George just buried their heads and ran, as if saying one more word to Duncan would be disrespectful to life.
Duncan's brows drew together.
He realised how serious it was.
He had never seen Fred and George this panicked before.
Fortunately, many students in the corridor had gone back to their compartments to rest at this moment, otherwise trying to flee quickly would have been a pipe dream.
Malfoy was in mid-curse when he saw Fred and the others fleeing in a panic.
He shut his mouth, turned to look at Crabbe and Goyle, and they all exchanged blank looks.
For Weasley children weren't the sort to give in so easily.
On the other side of the corridor, Neville and Hermione, hurrying over, appeared ahead.
They saw the three and waved happily.
"Duncan!"
"Why are you here too?" Duncan called back as he ran.
"We..." Hermione opened her mouth to answer, peering at Duncan in puzzlement.
From just now until now, every time she saw Duncan he was running.
Did he have a habit of exercising in the corridor?
"Forget it, don't say it yet."
Duncan slipped between Hermione and Neville, grabbed Hermione's hand with one hand, and with the case he carried shoved at Neville's back with the other, pulling them along as he ran for the distance.
"Saving our skins comes first!"
Hermione, bewildered, ran with Duncan and asked, confused, "What happened?"
Duncan opened his mouth to answer when a faint stench suddenly surged into his nostrils, growing stronger and stronger.
It smelled as if this carriage had been sunk into a cesspit, and they were being wrapped in countless gold.
George's face changed, his voice trembling as he spoke.
"It's over, it's over, we're too late..."
Only now did Duncan understand what that little ball was.
This smell was the same as the Dungbombs Fred and George made!
And not ordinary Dungbombs either.
The smell was clearly dozens of times stronger.
No wonder it was a gift prepared for Snape—potent enough!
"What do we do, Duncan?" Fred asked, face drawn, feeling like even speaking made him want to vomit.
At the same time, wretched screams and furious curses rang out one after another from the surrounding compartments.
"Merlin's beard, which bastard is boiling dung on the train?"
"Damn it, where are the prefects? Where are the professors? Somebody—anybody—come save us!"
"Mum, I don't want to go to school. I want to go home. Hogwarts is terrifying!"
...
Near the ball, Malfoy, Goyle, and Crabbe were the first to be struck by the stench.
They turned to run, but wave after wave of the smell flooded their noses.
Malfoy couldn't hold back the churning in his stomach any longer.
He bent and heaved a few times, then collapsed weakly to the side.
Before he blacked out completely, he used the last of his strength to curse.
"Damn Weasleys!"
Goyle and Crabbe fared only a little better than Malfoy.
They staggered a couple of steps and likewise toppled to the floor in a faint.
Fred and George's research product, a stellar success, had in the blink of an eye achieved a triple kill.
Duncan knew they couldn't keep running like this.
As the stench rapidly spread, they were bound to go down too.
"Where's your compartment?" Duncan asked Hermione at top speed.
"Th—the second one," Hermione answered with difficulty, pinching her mouth and nose.
"Anyone else inside?"
Hermione held her breath and shook her head quickly.
She felt as if she were about to pass out from suffocation.
During the holidays she had imagined the scene of starting school countless times.
She had imagined she might encounter a dragon, a troll, vampires, and so on—things from books.
But she had never imagined she would be drowned in stench!
"Fred, George, into the compartment!" Duncan shouted with the last of his strength.
"Got it!" Fred and George answered, nodded, swerved, and lunged into the room beside them.
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